Somewhere, in his private sea-side room in hell, Hitler is smiling

For the first time, criminal charges have been pressed against a German rabbi for performing circumcisions, a Jewish weekly reported on Tuesday.

A doctor from Hesse filed a criminal complaint against Rabbi David Goldberg, who serves in the community of Hof, in Upper Franconia (northern Bavaria), according to the Juedische Allgemeine weekly newspaper. The chief prosecutor of Hof confirmed that charges had been filed against the rabbi. The charges are based on the controversial decision of a Cologne district court, which ruled in June that circumcisions for religious reasons constitute illegal bodily harm to newborn babies.

“I am shocked,” said Cologne Rabbi Yaron Engelmayer, co-chairman of the national umbrella group of Orthodox rabbis in Germany, in a first reaction to the report. This marks the first time that a court in the Federal Republic of Germany is investigating a rabbi for performing a religious ritual, Engelmayer told the paper.

Goldberg, a qualified mohel (ritual circumciser) who says he has performed more than 3,000 circumcisions, was informed about the criminal charges against him by journalists, the paper said.

Born in Jerusalem, the 64-year-old has been the rabbi of Hof since 1997. Before World War II, about 3,000 Jews lived in Hof. Today, the community counts about 400 members.

“This latest development in Hof is yet another grave affront to religious freedom and underlines the urgent need for the German government to expedite the process of ensuring that the fundamental rights of minority communities are protected. We call upon the Minister of the Interior to take immediate action to secure those rights in the short term,” Conference of European Rabbis, Chief Rabbi Pinchas Goldschmidt said. […]

15 thoughts on “Somewhere, in his private sea-side room in hell, Hitler is smiling”

I’m wondering if this international movement to criminalize circumcision also will include prosecuting Muslims, or is this just another front in the anti-Jew war waged by the left to delegitimize Israel?

I’m really surprised that anyone dared ban circumcision, not because of Jews, but rather because of Muslims. There are millions of Muslims in German and all around Europe and they’re not to reticent about declaring Jihads and rioting. Besides, you know how it is, you have to treat Muslims with kid gloves. Allah forbid that anyone offends them in the slightest way possible. You know how it is, you can’t even touch them with a rose petal. Just ask the French and British who literally bend over backwards for them.

“Jewish and Muslim leaders were united on Wednesday in their condemnation of a German court’s decision to in effect outlaw the circumcision of boys after a judge deemed that the religious practice amounted to bodily harm. Representatives of the two religious communities called the ruling insensitive and discriminatory, saying it was an attack on centuries of religious tradition.”

And as noted in the article, female circumcision is already outlawed in Germany.

Well Fuzzy, then it should only be moments until we read about a doctor charged with performing the rite on a Muslim boy, considering there are over 4 million Muslims in Germany, and only around 200,000 Jews.

You know, if anybody should be exquisitely sensitive, tactful and accommodating toward Jews, and bend WAY over backwards to avoid offending them, that would be Germany. In principle, although the details are quite different, I feel similarly about Spain with respect to Cubans. Evidently, however, neither Germany nor Spain seems to recognize the obvious, or maybe they simply don’t give a shit. Unreal.

“Jews and Muslims are joining forces in outrage over a German court’s decision that could prohibit parents from having their children circumcised for religious reasons … The case began in Cologne in 2010 after a doctor performed a circumcision on a 4-year-old Muslim boy. His parents took him to a hospital two days later because he was bleeding heavily, the Medical Daily website reported. When prosecutors learned of the emergency room visit, they brought criminal charges against the doctor.”

“German Court Says Circumcision Illegal: Muslim Doctor from Cologne, Germany Guilty – The case that prompted the current ruling concerned a Muslim doctor in Cologne who had circumcised a four-year-old boy at the request of his parents. When the boy began bleeding two days after the surgery and needed to be brought into the emergency room the doctor was charged with causing bodily injury.”

Fuzzy, I’m trying to understand what point you are tying to make. Is it that the ban on infant circumcision isn’t anti-Jew? Because it is, irrespective of the fact that circumcision is also universal to Muslims. In Judaism, Brit Milah (covenant of circumcision) is performed at eight days of age. In Islam, there is not set age, and has often been performed at the age of seven. Also, in Islam, although it is preferred, you do not have to be circumcised for conversion, unlike in Judaism. An uncircumcised male cannot be a religious Jew, and therefore banning circumcision makes the practice of Judaism unlawful.

From a BBC article:

For the majority of Muslims, circumcision is seen as an introduction to the Islamic faith and a sign of belonging.

In Islam there is no fixed age for circumcision. The age at which it is performed varies depending on family, region and country.

The preferred age is often seven although some Muslims are circumcised as early as the seventh day after birth and as late as puberty.

There is no equivalent of a Jewish ‘mohel’ in Islam. Circumcisions are usually carried out in a clinic or hospital. The circumciser is not required to be a Muslim but he must be medically trained.

In some Islamic countries circumcision is performed after Muslim boys have recited the whole of the Qur’an from start to finish.

In Malaysia, for example, the operation is a puberty rite that separates the boy from childhood and introduces him to adulthood.

An essential practice

Circumcision is not compulsory in Islam but it is an important ritual aimed at improving cleanliness. It is strongly encouraged but not enforced.

The ritual dates back to the time of the Prophet Muhammad. According to tradition Muhammad was born without a foreskin (aposthetic). Some Muslims who practise circumcision see it as a way of being like him.

Ziva, in your first post you asked: “I’m wondering if this international movement to criminalize circumcision also will include prosecuting Muslims, or is this just another front in the anti-Jew war”.

Don’t read more into my posts than there is. I simply tried to answer your question. At least in Germany, this circumcision thing started more as an anti-Muslim thing than anti-Jewish. Regardless of whether circumcision is compulsory or not in Islam, it was Muslims who were initially prosecuted for this in recent years in Germany, not Jews. I suppose if we want to be all conspiracy-minded, we can imagine that this was some sort of sneaky back door attempt to attack Jews in Germany through a law that was first used to prosecute Muslims.

In Germany, it appears that Muslim AND Jewish leaders are banding together to fight this law. Both camps find it offensive.

Incidentally, apparently Germany has had a ban on head coverings for a number of years now. It was affirmed in this case:

Did you read Pitbull’s post? It’s not about Muslims. It’s about the fact that Germany, in light of their history is outlawing a ritual necessary for the practice of Judaism, and the charges against a German Rabbi. The fact that a botched procedure by a Muslim doctor is stated as the reason for the law is disingenuous. The fact is, the anti-Zionist crowd has been doing their best to end infant male circumcision for a long time, and have been thwarted in that effort by accusations of anti-Semitism, i.e. anti-Jew. This was a perfect opportunity. You know, never let an opportunity go to waste…? The rising tide of anti-Jewish fervor in Europe is well documented, fanned by leftist anti-Zionist propaganda. You can think and believe whatever you want, but I have no doubt that that the target is the Jews, not Muslims. I don’t give a fuck that the “first” case involves a Muslim doctor. If you don’t believe me, you need to read more history and facts on Communism, anti-Semitism, and the alliance of the radical lef, radical Islam, and the movement to isolate and destroy Israel.

Fuzzy to clarify, and help you sweep away the cobwebs on this issue, think about this. A founding principle of our Western Judeo-Christian civilization is Jewish law, i.e. The Ten Commandments. If in so-called free and democratic nations, the practice of Judaism is unlawful, then our civilzation is at stake. This has nothing to do with Muslims!

The uproar over circumcision barely conceals a revulsion at the concept of the sacred in all its forms. The German court replaces the Jewish and Christian belief in sanctity of human life and the human body with a perverse concept of rights deriving from bodily proprietorship. In this brave new world, it is legal to bring your grandmother to a Zurich hospital to be euthanized but criminal to bring a newborn boy to be circumcised. It is doubly perverse because the West first learned of human rights, and the rights of newborns in particular, from the Jews. Banish the source of these rights and the notion of rights will eventually turn into a twisted mockery…Erase the line between what is sacred and what is merely utilitarian, and there is nothing in principle to prevent us from subjecting low-value (minderwertig) life to the cost-benefit analysis of the killers. That German physicians and attorneys campaign with such bitter determination to uproot the source of the sacred—the Jewish concept of covenant—from German society is downright chilling. Don’t they remember?

Don’t they remember? Sure they do, but evidently they have little or no shame. The lack of propriety, or even just common sense, is simply stunning. It’s not as if Jewish mothers (who, like Cuban mothers, don’t have the reputation they do for nothing) would ever put their newborn sons at risk. Mohels know their stuff, and they’ve been doing it quite well forever. The business about protecting infants, at least Jewish ones, is a convenient and very “correct” pretext for something rather different. Very.